Trip report – Rakiura Northwest Circuit
Dates: 16th-17th January 2026
Distance: ~125km
Elevation gain: ~6,000m
Party members: Michael Mitchell, Ben Adams, Petrus Hedman
Invercargill to Rakiura:
Bit of a hectic morning, after some missed alarms and poor communication about what time we’d need to leave to catch our flight to Rakiura. After a mad dash to the airport, there was just enough time to scoff down a cheese roll for breakfast and transfer power banks to our carry-on luggage – we’ll come back to this. The pilot bluntly denied Michael from taking his coffee onboard, which necessitated an early raid of the No-Doz stash.
Once on the island, it was a smooth operation with a pre-booked cab, quick stop at a friend’s place to drop off extra gear and then out to Lee Bay in time for a pre-run photoshoot and a 9am start.
Lee Bay to Long Harry Hut:
The gently-rolling, Great Walk-standard track, was a beautiful warm-up and the conditions were perfect – cool but not raining. The spirits were high. Just after Maori beach we ran into an amiable park ranger, who, after hearing of our plan, made an astute observation that running the Northwest Circuit in single push is indeed the way to go, as one would not be unduly burdened by the weight of the brains. Hard to argue with that.
After Port William, there is a clear decline in the standard of the track, presumably to discourage the unprepared Great Walk punters from venturing too far. Still, it was very pleasant going and we made good progress through to Murray Beach, where a couple of hunters were the next in line to question the sanity of our operation.
Somewhere between dropping into and climbing out of the endless gullies on the next stretch, we had our first kiwi encounter - Such cool birds! Bit later there was an almighty scream and a continuous stream of expletives from the back of the pack, which had the rest of the crew worried about an imminent DNF situation. Luckily it was just a stubbed toe and nothing a bit of Paracetamol and swearing wouldn’t fix. The turn-off to Yankee River hut turn-off signalled the start of the first decent uphill slog of the day. Track was still good though, and the legs reasonably fresh, so it was no big bother and after the drop down to the Smoky beach on the other side, we were rewarded with some beautiful sand dunes.
Quick dash across the beach and over another little hump and we arrived at the Long Harry hut around 5:30pm. While organising our gear for the upcoming stretch, Michael realized he had been lugging an extra 20,000mAh powerbank the whole time, forgetting to pull it out of his pack after the flight. Oh well, what’s another 500g since we CLEARLY don’t have any brain-weight to slow us down. A ChatGPT-generated timing sheet promised a good chance of a sub-30hr finish, so we allowed ourselves a little pit stop to stretch and clean the feet. ChatGPT did not know what was to come however, and neither did we. It was also around this time that we started to wonder why everyone had been fussing about the mud. We would learn soon enough.
Long Harry Hut to Big Hellfire Hut
Relatively incident-free stretch of travel until we were dropping down towards the East Ruggedy beach and heard a helicopter coming around the corner. Strange place and time for a scenic flight, so when the chopper briefly started heading to our direction, there was a moment of concern that one of our PLBs might have accidentally gotten set off.
Turns out the pilot was probably just looking for a suitable landing site to evacuate a distressed tramper from the East Ruggedy hut. The heli had just taken off by the time we made it to the hut, so the drama was relayed to us second-hand by the lovely bunch from the Nelson Tramping Club who were staying the night. After just watching one unprepared young man get flown out at taxpayer’s expense, they would have been well within their rights to question the lightness of our packs (Michael’s extra powerbank notwithstanding) and whether they should try and get the heli to turn back and pick up a few more loonies. Instead, they were quite interested in what we were up to, asking questions about our nutrition and giving tips for the track ahead, which was really nice and gave a big boost for the next few kilometres.
The descent to and the following stretch along the West Ruggedy Beach was probably the highlight of the trip, with the sun starting to set behind Whenua Hou in the distance. Absolutely unreal scene! The reality soon started to sink in however, as the sun disappeared and the headtorches came out. We found the mud we’d been looking for, with the pace slowing down to just over 3kms per hour and it was to stay there until hitting the beach at Mason Bay the following morning.
Some sections of the track were very steep and quite overgrown with vegetation, so with the slippery mud underfoot, every step became a game of Russian roulette on your ankle ligaments. Good times. On the bright side, we had been somewhat worried about arriving at Mason Bay too early for the low tide and that was definitely not a concern anymore. The uphill climb from Waituna Bay to Big Hellfire hut started with us losing the track for 10 minutes and then proceeded to drag on for ages, so it was a sight to sore legs when we finally pulled up onto the deck just after 1am, for a 20-minute powernap (Well, for those of us who hadn’t just popped a caffeine pill 30mins earlier). The rest of the trampers in the hut were probably less impressed, even though we tried to be mindful and stayed to rest on the deck outside. It turns out that washing your feet and shoes in a metal sink about 1m above the ground, when your motor skills have been reduced to those of a toddler, is quite noisy business.
Just as we were leaving, Ben rounded the corner of the hut and was confronted with someone squatting for a leak right on the track. “What are you doing David?!” was the lady’s rightful query at the bizarre situation and provided us with some good chuckles for the following days. Whoever David is, he must’ve had a hell to pay the following morning.
Big Hellfire Hut to Freshwater Hut
Mud, tree roots, uphill, downhill and lost footings, briefly interrupted by the reprieve of the Little Hellfire Beach, were pretty much the story for the next 3hrs, until finally slipping and sliding our way down towards the Mason Bay beach. Just above the beach, we were stopped on our tracks by a menacing seal pup who seemed, if possible, even more confused at the blinding headtorches than the squatting lady a few hours earlier. A bit of deliberation ensued, as there was impenetrable bush on one side of the track and a rather precipitous drop on the other. In the end we had to skirt around the seal bit closer than the Department of Conservation’s recommended 20m distance from wildlife.
The 4km of flatness and runnability of the beach was wasted on our tired legs and heads, which could only manage speed-walking at this point. Still, it was good to be able to zone out and not worry about your foot placement at every step.
We stopped for another powernap and admin break at the Mason Bay hut, after arriving around 6am. This was a much-needed reset and got us moving a lot better for the next section towards Freshwater hut. Michael’s watch clocked us momentarily reaching a top speed of 5:30min/km!
Freshwater Hut to Fern Gully
After Freshwater hut the pace dropped off drastically again and saw our slowest 5km stretch of the whole circuit, as the big climb and steep descent into the North Arm basin followed by endless ups and downs along the shoreline took their toll on the already-fatigued legs and minds.
Last 10kms from the North Arm hut to the end of the track were slow and boring but steady. About halfway through someone made a highly optimistic suggestion of the sub-30hr finish still being possible, which was quickly shot down by Michael and Ben’s more realistic take on the remaining distance. In the end we limped to the Fern Gully car park about 20mins behind our goal time but still a couple of hours ahead of the previous FKT, held by certain Dunedinite acquaintances.
It took about 5 seconds for the tired brains to register we had actually arrived at the car park, until our ride to town waved us down from her car. Once the fist bumps had been exchanged and a quick photoshoot taken, we were on our way to Oban to finally get the shoes off and inspect the carnage that 30hrs in wet shoes can do to one’s hoofs. Lukewarm pesto pasta from a supermarket bag never tasted better!